Mars Colony - Page 3

On November 30 2012 13:19 {CC}StealthBlue wrote:


But they wouldn't be sitting there they would be exploring, prospecting, building, and trying to make the colony self sufficient economically. Of course it would not be the only colony, trade built the world and the Solar System is no exception.

Zubrin actually explains this in painful detail in his book "The Case for Mars."

Link

On November 30 2012 14:35 Cel.erity wrote:
Doesn't make sense to me. You'd have to pay me a hell of a lot of money to move to Mars, $500k wouldn't even be enough. Why would I pay you to escort me to a hellish wasteland, devoid of any life or entertainment, knowing that my death may be well at hand? For the few people in this thread who say they would do it, I imagine the motive is either divine curiosity or extreme loneliness. In either case, being wealthy tends to make you complacent and lose those motives because you're obviously doing pretty well on Earth.

On November 30 2012 14:23 Cold Warpgates wrote:


I admit I only did the most cursory scan of the book you linked, so it's entirely possible I missed the answer to the questions I'm about to ask. But: What are they going to trade on Mars? I'm sure there are at least some substances present on Mars that people pay a lot for here on Earth, but I find it hard to believe it could possible be financially worth it. I suppose this is where the 'prospecting' you mentioned comes into question, and I certainly think its worth it for a variety of reasons to determine what exactly is on Mars, but with the information we (or I) have now I just don't see that being viable.

Also, everything I've read on the subject by informed authorities (which probably isn't that much, granted) has said that the most likely targets in the Solar System for economic development are asteroids. Granted that has plenty of costs of its own, but as I understand it the amount of resources in asteroids is astronomical (ha, ha) when compared to the terrestrial planets.

On November 30 2012 14:49 {CC}StealthBlue wrote:



You have to spend money to make money:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colonization_of_Mars#Economics

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_trade#A_motivator_for_colonization_of_Mars

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mm34Muv6Lsg

Nobody is saying that we have to go one planet/asteroid at a time. In fact we could easily be working on the Moon and Mars at the same time making an effort to create a economic boom in construction, mining.

On November 29 2012 23:23 DigiGnar wrote:
If this happened, it would be enormously... scary. What if war breaks out on Mars? What if Earth and Mars war? Lazer outfitted spaceships!

On November 29 2012 23:37 Bourneq wrote:

I lol'd at that so hard. I will never have that amount of money, problably not even if I save every penny from now on to the end of my life. But I hope this works and we get some people on Mars.

On November 30 2012 16:57 emythrel wrote:
There is a reason why NASA or a similar organisation has to exist for us to go to Mars.... because the private sector will never stump up the cash on such a risky venture. The public sector therefore does the initial exploring and forges the way and later the private sector takes over, it has always been that way. Every voyage of discovery ever made was funded by a government.

There is no infrastructure on Mars, why would I pay to go there and forsake the creature comforts here on Earth? Personally I would pay to go but thats because my dream is to live on Mars. Anyone foolish enough to think that private citizens will fund going to Mars for the first time really should read up on the history of exploration, specifically of the epic voyages across the oceans and in to space. All of them, without exception were funded by governments in the hope of some financial or other return of wealth. They were simply too expensive for any single person or group of people to fund without a guarantee of r.o.i

On November 30 2012 17:15 wherebugsgo wrote:


the first part (about why private industry will never invest in such a risky venture) is incredibly true.

Personally I don't think colonization of an extraterrestrial planet will be possible until the bulk of the terraforming process can be done without humans present. It's pretty ludicrous to consider that humans would be willing to pay ridiculous sums of money just to perform what is essentially slave labor on a desolate planet. The ideals of being a pioneer like that are pretty lofty and unrealistic; most people who would be willing to go would almost certainly find that their imagination deceived them. I wouldn't at all be surprised if people who went to Mars in such a situation would just commit suicide after a while because of the incredible desolation of the place and the difficulty of the task at hand.

I think that it is far more interesting and fruitful for now to explore what remotely controlled machines can do. The technology can be developed here on Earth and then potentially be deployed in space. Space agencies already do this with rovers, though rovers are merely for exploration and they're not intended to change the landscape significantly. This type of idea has even been explored in science fiction, and it is not particularly novel, but vastly more practical than using human labor. Imagine using a relatively advanced machine or robot of some kind that can either be remotely controlled or is automated. It travels with some essential materials to Mars or the moon or wherever, and then extracts or obtains the rest somehow at the destination. The machine or robot then constructs other machines/robots that can do things like generate power, lift objects, drill, etc. etc. It wouldn't have to be one machine;it could be a series of small machines that each do a different task, either sent all together or on different spaceflights. Using ores on Mars (it's fairly rich in iron oxide, for example) to create things locally without humans would be much more efficient than actually sending trained, willing humans there.

The private sector would only be involved if the endeavour reaped some sort of benefit for the cost. If the cost is sunk then the benefit would have to be indirect (i.e. publicity or marketing). I doubt there are any sorts of natural resources on Mars that would be useful to us here that we can't get already(and the logistics of transport are insane) so almost certainly the benefits would have to be indirect, through research or publicity or whatever.

E: Also I cannot think of any sort of incentive that would convince people to pay to leave Earth forever, when there is no hope for life of any sort of standard like you can achieve here for the kind of cost that is being thrown around here. Regardless of the cost, your life as you know it would be over if you decided to go to Mars.